Gascolator

In article ,
wrote:

Jonathan Goodish wrote:
: Has anyone used the Steve's Aircraft FAA-PMA gascolator STC on a
: Cherokee? I am curious as to whether it is worth the trouble of
: changing the stock gascolator to get rid of the whole bail wire fiasco.
: Not sure how the drain valve would work, might have to use some fittings.

What fiasco? Aside from replacing the gasket every once in awhile is
there a
flaw in the original gascolator I'm unaware of?

In my opinion, it is a rather poor design. The bowl requires that the
bail wire hold it securely, and bail wires have been known to jump off
the assembly, threads on the thumb screw get stripped making it
impossible to tighten, etc. Stripped threads appear to be common, and
fuel leaks seem to be common as a result. There are some accidents in
the NTSB database that were caused by the bowl coming off in flight
(resulting in engine failure) due to stripped threads on the bail wire.

The "problems" seem to be due to folks over-torquing the thumb screw in
order to "fix" a bad seal, rather than replacing the gasket.
Occasionally, this over-torquing will actually bend the top of the bowl,
making a good seal impossible even with a good gasket.

My bail wire is still holds the bowl tight, but it is stripped and may
not stay tight forever. The Piper replacement part is $170 just for the
bail wire. If you want the entire gascolator, it's something like $700,
which is just insane. Why not replace it with a better design?




JKG